Fairness for charter schools

By Robert Cane
Washington

As The Post did in the June 3 editorial “Departure point in D.C.,” the District’s public charter school community welcomes the new teachers union contract.

Charters welcome the contract because they are strong supporters of Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee’s reforms and higher pay for all teachers in District public schools.

It is incorrect to assert, as The Post’s editorial did, that some charters were considering legal action to “upend the contract.” Charter leaders are reluctantly considering suing the city, not D.C. Public Schools, not because of the contract, but because Mayor Adrian M. Fenty is unwilling to fund D.C. charter schools equitably.

The D.C. School Reform Act requires that the operating costs of both types of public school — charter and traditional — be funded via the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula. This formula was designed to ensure equal public funding for all D.C. public school children. Yet the administration continues to defy the law and spends millions on city-run schools outside the formula, depriving the charters of public funds.

Current inequities in public funding mean that the allocation in city taxpayer funds for the typical charter school student is $5,000 less than the allocation for the typical public school student. We want fair funding for D.C. kids.

The writer is executive director of Friends of Choice in Urban Schools.